Soapbox on Youtube
Check out Soapbox's new Youtube channel here: http://www.youtube.com/soapboxinc
In June, Soapbox Inc invited young feminists from around the country to a week-long Feminist Summer Camp in NYC! Here's a clip of some of the campers hanging out (pun!) at SLAM!, feminist motion architect Elizabeth Streb's studio. The campers obviously enjoyed the chance to kick back after a week of running around the City meeting with feminist organizations!
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Feminist Summer Camper's Article Featured on CampusProgress.org
Extremely amazing activist (and Feminist Summer Camper 2010) Stephanie Herold has an article this week on Campus Progress about the myth that young feminists don't exist. In the article, Stephanie gives many examples of the new--mostly online--avenues of activism that young feminists are creating every day!
Soapbox Feminist Summer Camp on Salon.com
In a really nice article from earlier this week, Stephanie Hughes gives a peek into what Soapbox's Feminist Summer Camp is all about. Although it's difficult to explain what a mix of personal and professional development each session is, she shines a light on some specific ways that camp promotes community-building in every sense; AND features perspectives from both recent campers and an older alumna! We're so happy to hear about what people learned from their camp experiences--if you'd like to add your two cents, please let us know! And if you're interested in attending next January's Winter Term (the less sweltering, more sweater-ing version of summer camp), click here!
Ms. Magazine Blog Gives Love to Feminist Summer Camp (Quiz-Style!)
Now that Summer Camp's over, fight off the post-camp blues with a fun quiz on the Ms. Magazine Blog! For non-campers, test your NYC Feminism knowledge and see if maybe you should consider a trip to camp!
Soapbox Feminist Summer Camp on Phem.org
Awesome Feminist Summer Camper, Amy Edler, is blogging over at Phem.org about FSC 2010. Check it out here!
(photo by Amy Edler)
Soapbox Feminist Summer Camp on NHPR
Soapbox Feminist Summer Camp 2010 was featured on New Hampshire Public Radio! Click here for the piece, which was aired on Word of Mouth.
Feminist Summer Camp, Part 2
Wednesday
The group met at the Ms. Foundation for Women today to hear from Suzanne Grossman, Kara Pollard Elverson, and Melissa Marie Gonzalez about feminism in the workplace, career advice, and grad school. We learned about job searching tips, the importance of researching grad school programs, the importance of putting ourselves out there, and a lot of other advice.
When that informative session was over, we had lunch and listened to Courtney Martin, Julie Scelfo, and Veronica Chambers talk about different feminist approaches to media. Courtney talked about her journey as a freelance feminist author, writing a book and blogging for Feministing.com. Julie discussed her background as a journalist and her experience at various big-name news corporations, such as Newsweek and the New York Times. Veronica talked about her experience at Glamour magazine and their Women of the Year awards ceremony.
We traveled to the Feminist Press in Manhattan and discovered what it means to run a feminist publishing company. We learned about what makes a book feminist enough to be published by the press, about the various tasks of Feminist Press interns, the long and powerful history of the organization, and the steps it takes for a book to be published. We had a short but lively debate about the future of print media and the impact of reading devices (such as iPads and Kindles) and then left for Bust magazine.
At Bust, we met with Debbie Stoller, Executive Director and one of the Founders of the magazines. She told us about the history of Bust, her conception of cultural feminism, her vision for the magazine and how it's changed over the years. We talked briefly about blogs and magazines and then left to go our separate ways for dinner.
Many members of the group went to a happy hour event sponsored by Paradigm Shift, Soapbox, and Feministing.com. We schmoozed with the feminist elite of NYC including Shelby Knox, Jessica Valenti, the staff of Paradigm Shift, Courtney Martin, and many more! It was surreal and amazing to be in the same room as so many brilliant women.
Thursday
This morning we met in Brooklyn at a space called Powder Keg, a place created by writers as an intentional space for writing and creativity. We had an introduction to the space by two of the writers who established it and they told us about its history and how they modeled it on Virginia Woolf's idea that each writer needs a room (or space) of her own.
The Guerilla Girls came and gave us an interactive workshop about their work protesting the lack of women's work in the art world, particularly focusing on theaters that don't perform and produce plays written by women. They had us create our own one minute visual representation of certain issues in feminism, such as intersectionality, the power of language, why feminism is considered a "bad word," and gender non-conformity.
The two women who founded Arts Effects came and talked to us about their theater company that focuses on promoting good relationships between girls. Their teen girl campers wrote a play that ended up touring across the country and winning several awards. They had us talk about our feminist click moments and improv short plays that incorporate all of our experiences.
We took the train to a different part of Brooklyn to a place called Streb Lab for Action Mechanics, where we learned what pop action art is and participated in an hour and a half long pop action class. We learned different dance/action techniques, such as the "klump," and practiced "popping" into different poses.
Friday
We each had our own feminist internship today! Some people went for four hours, others for eight or more hours, at different feminist organizations all around NYC.
Feminist Summer Camp, Part 1
Feminist Summer Camp is something to write home about! We'll be posting updates from the past week here at Soapbox Blog. Big thanks to Feminist Summer Camper, Steph, for these posts!
Monday
Feminist Summer Camp started out with a bang! Or really, a click -- we started the morning by having brunch in Central Park and talking about our feminist "click" moments. The group split into two groups to learn about sex trafficking; one group went to the Sex Worker's Project and the other went to the NoVo Foundation.
At the Novo Foundation, we talked with Pam Shiffman. Here's a re-cap of our discussion:
- NoVo works to end violence against women and girls, particularly in countries in conflict or post-conflict situations and also works to end sex trafficking
- There are two main models of feminist and human rights frames for thinking about sex trafficking. One is the Dutch model, or the regulatory model, and the other is the Swedish model
- NoVo focuses on the Swedish model, which operates under the assumptions that prostitution is akin to violence against women, women end up in sex work because of a lack of other choices, state policy should be criminalizing those who exploit women as well as their customers, and that sex workers should be entitled to state benefits such as welfare
- NoVo thinks about this work in terms gender equality, and that most women want other options besides sex work
We discussed the positive and negative sides of this approach as well as the importance of demanding more of our governments and of not resigning ourselves to compromise when it comes to our rights. We also discussed how to reconcile the differences between people working on all aspects of sex work and sex trafficking advocacy.
We then went to Babeland, a sex-positive, feminist sex shop to learn about what it means to be sex positive and, of course, browsed Babeland's huge selection of sex toys. After a lunch break, we headed to the International Women's Health Coalition. We met with Audacia Ray and Lori Adelman to talk about IWHC's work surrounding sex work and sex trafficking.
Here is a summary of our discussion:
- IWHC works to empower local leaders and organizations, advocate in the UN and national capitals, mobilize women and young people to act, and inform power brokers, influentials, and health professionals-
- Sex worker rights are human rights: bodily autonomy, right to work and support your family, freedom from violence and coercion
- What is the difference between sex work and sex trafficking? Sex work can be a choice, whereas trafficking implies moving people across borders without consent, or having people perform actions without their consent
- There are economic realities and inequities that put women into sex work, and the sex industry will not disappear with the economic inequities still in place
We also watched a video documenting IWHC's work in India helping sex workers gain access to HIV testing and basic health services.
Back at the Hostel, we had dinner with Shelby Knox, who talked to us about her experience growing up in Lubbock, TX, learning how to be a feminist organizer, and her vision for the future of feminism. Shelby inspired us to think about ways we can change and engage our communities at home, and the power of the voices of youth.
Tuesday
Today our focus is reproductive justice. We split into different groups in the morning to go to different organizations within that movement.
My group met with Lynn Paltrow, the Executive Director of National Advocates for Pregnant Women. We talked about the importance of expanding the pro-choice community to include people who fight for birthing rights.
We also talked about:
- The importance of talking to people who don't necessarily consider themselves pro-choice but, through life experience, have come to understand the importance of women's health advocacy
- The similarities between between the birthing rights community and pro-choice community
- How a lot of current legislation makes it possible for states to overrule a woman's right to her body, control the kind of birth she wants, and what happens while she's in labor
After that stimulating conversation, everyone met up at the Third Wave Foundation to debrief about all of our experiences. We reflected on our different morning meetings with National Advocates for Pregnant Women, Choices in Childbirth, the Guttmacher Institute, and Choices Medical Center. We unpacked the difference between "pro-choice" and "reproductive justice" and how this benefits our movement.
We watched a video produced by the Third Wave Foundation about all the dynamic, engaging work that their funded organizations do. We learned about Third Wave's emergency abortion fund and participated in an exercise that helped us think about the difficulties of abortion funding. When our time was over there, we split up to go to different meetings again. People went to either the Doula Project, Sistas on the Rise, or Spence Chapin Adoption Agency.
At the Doula Project, we learned the difference between a doula and a midwife, and the different types of doula (birth, adoption, and abortion) that the Doula Project provides. We also talked about how doulas are trained, why doulas are needed, and how doulas help women across the spectrum of pregnancy.
